About the author

My name is John Stoltenberg. I love going to the theater, and in this blog I write my reflections about what I see.

In college I wrote, produced, directed, and acted in plays. I continued through grad school—earning an M.F.A. in theater arts—then worked as writer-in-residence and administrative director with the influential experimental theater company The Open Theatre, whose legendary artistic director was Joe Chaikin. My plays were produced off-off-Broadway. I won a New York State Arts Council grant to write plays. Then my life abruptly changed course. I turned to writing nonfiction and what became a career as a magazine editor. But I kept going to the theater, the art form that for me has always been the most transcendent and transporting and best illuminates the acts and ethics that connect us.

With my post-apocalyptic novel, GONERZ, I found my way back to character and story invention.

I named Magic Time! after that magical moment between life and art just before a show begins. I like thinking about how art makes sense of life—and vice versa.

I now have a column (also called Magic Time!) on the DC Metro Theater Arts (DCMTA) website, and my blog entries here are reposted there with photos. You can see my DCMTA archive here.